Dow Plunges Nearly 500 Points As China Fears Rattle Investors

Dow Plunges Nearly 500 Points As China Fears Rattle Investors

John Hugh DeMastri on November 28, 2022

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell nearly 500 points Monday afternoon, down roughly 1.45% at time of writing, as investors feared that an outburst of protests across China would dampen global productivity, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite were both down roughly 1.55% at time of writing, with the plunge across all indices deepened in the afternoon by comments from New York Federal Reserve Bank President John Williams, who said that elevated inflation may persist into 2024, the WSJ reported. Earlier Monday, Bloomberg reported that violent protests and COVID-19 lockdown measures at an iPhone production facility would cause the company to miss its production goals for iPhone Pro models by roughly 6 million units.

“When you look at Apple not being able to fulfill the orders for their iPhone because the factories in China are shut down, I think that’s a perfect example of how something in one country can affect somewhere else,” Victoria Fernandez, chief market strategist at investment management firm Crossmark Global Investments, told CNBC. “It just has a ripple effect through the global economy when you have something as large as the Chinese economy shutting down.”

Monday’s selloff put downward pressure on the stock of companies with critical infrastructure and supply chain exposure to China, according to CNBC. At time of writing, Apple shares had fallen 2.6% on the day, according to Google Finance.

Public defiance of authorities is rare in China, especially on such a widespread scale, according to the WSJ. In what appeared to be a bid to quell the protests — which began after 10 people were killed in a burning high-rise after reportedly being trapped by doors and lockdown barriers — Chinese authorities eased a variety of restrictions across the nation.